Kenny Rogers points to the crowd while performing in this July 30, 2003 file photo, at the South Dakota State Fair in Huron, S.D. A tiny western Indiana town is organizing a concert featuring country music stars Rogers, Sarah Evans and Ricky Van Shelton to raise money to revive the community. The town of Waveland, population about 500, will use the proceeds of the June 5, 2004, concert to repair sidewalks, install streetlights and improve playgrounds, said Brenda Jones, one of the organizers.

Kenny Rogers points to the crowd while performing in this July 30, 2003 file photo, at the South Dakota State Fair in Huron, S.D. A tiny western Indiana town is organizing a concert featuring country music

Kenny Rogers points to the crowd while performing July 30, 2003, at the South Dakota State Fair in Huron, S.D.

Kenny Rogers points to the crowd while performing July 30, 2003, at the South Dakota State Fair in Huron, S.D.

Photo: ERIC JOHNSON, AP

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Country singer Kenny Rogers and his wife Wanda pose for photographers as they arrive at the Kennedy Center for the 29th Annual Gala in Washington December 3, 2006.

Country singer Kenny Rogers and his wife Wanda pose for photographers as they arrive at the Kennedy Center for the 29th Annual Gala in Washington December 3, 2006.

Photo: JOSHUA ROBERTS, REUTERS

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Kenny Rogers performs at the ACM Presents: Lionel Richie and Friends in Concert on Monday April 2, 2012, in Las Vegas.

Kenny Rogers performs at the ACM Presents: Lionel Richie and Friends in Concert on Monday April 2, 2012, in Las Vegas.

Photo: Jeff Bottari, Associated Press

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Kenny Rogers performs at the 2012 CMA Music Festival on Saturday, June 9, 2012, in Nashville, Tenn.

Kenny Rogers performs at the 2012 CMA Music Festival on Saturday, June 9, 2012, in Nashville, Tenn.

Photo: WADE PAYNE/INVISION/AP

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In this undated publicity image released by Dreamcatcher Entertainment, country singer Kenny Rogers is shown.

In this undated publicity image released by Dreamcatcher Entertainment, country singer Kenny Rogers is shown.

Photo: AP

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Singer/Songwriter Kenny Rogers promotes his memoir "Luck Or Something Like It" at Barnes & Noble Citigroup Center on October 3, 2012, in New York City.

Singer/Songwriter Kenny Rogers promotes his memoir "Luck Or Something Like It" at Barnes & Noble Citigroup Center on October 3, 2012, in New York City.

Photo: Slaven Vlasic, Getty Images

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Kenny Rogers has publicly admitted that he's not thrilled with the results of his plastic surgery.

Kenny Rogers has publicly admitted that he's not thrilled with the results of his plastic surgery.

Photo: Mark Humphrey, AP

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Kenny Rogers' popular holiday tour started by accident

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Country legend Kenny Rogers says it's kind of funny the way his Christmas shows came about.

He was touring the nation and singing his hits one December.

“A guy in the back yelled, ‘Hey, it's Christmas — you should be doing Christmas music,'” Rogers recalled in a phone interview. “The next year I worked up 10 or 15 minutes of Christmas songs, and someone yelled, ‘Hey, do “Ruby, Don't Take Your Love to Town.”'”

The mix of hits and classic yuletide songs must have clicked, though. Rogers has been doing it for 31 years

His 22-city 2012 Christmas & Hits Tour with special guest Billy Dean will stop at 7:30 p.m. Monday at the Majestic Theatre.

The Christmas part of the show will include classics and originals such as “White Christmas,” “Silent Night,” “Joy to the World” and “Mary, Did You Know,” which Rogers recorded with Wynonna Judd in 1997. With 65 albums selling more than 120 million copies and 24 No. 1 singles, he'll have plenty of hits to choose from, but for sure they will include “Lady,” “The Gambler,” “Islands in the Stream,” “Daytime Friends,” “Lucille” and “Coward of the County.”

“Billy is a buddy of mine and a great talent,” Rogers said of Dean, who sang harmony along with Alison Krauss on Rogers' 2000 No. 1 single “Buy Me a Rose.”

Dean's 13 Top 10 singles include “Only Here for a Little While,” “Billy the Kid” and “Let Them be Little.” In September he released “A Man of Good Fortune,” his first studio album in almost four years.

Rogers also released several projects this fall, “Christmas Live!” from his holiday tour and “Amazing Grace,” a re-release of 2011's “The Love of God,” his first album of gospel music.

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He also released “Luck or Something Like It,” the New York Times best-selling memoir that covers growing up in poverty in Depression-era Houston, his rise to fame and friendships that mean the most to him, from Dottie West and Dolly Parton to Lionel Richie, with whom he sings a duet of “Lady” on Richie's CD “Tuskegee,” the best-selling album of 2012.

When he started writing the book, Rogers, who told the publisher it would not be salacious, realized he had forgotten many of the steps along the way to his phenomenal success.

“Luckily, I have people around me, band members who've been with me for 40 years, who said remember this, remember that and recalled how much joy I'd glossed over in the process of being successful,” he said.

He said his mother was the biggest influence in his life.

“She only had a third-grade education, but she was so wise and picked words carefully,” he said. “She told me once to always be happy where you are — if not, you'll never be happy.

“Even at down times in my career, I was always happy. There were no really bad times, just times I didn't make as much money. The fact I was doing something I love so much made life easy.”

Rogers formed his first band, the rockabilly group the Scholars, in 1956 while in high school. In 1966, he joined the folk group The New Christy Minstrels. In 1968, his group the First Edition scored big with “Just Dropped in (To See What Condition My Condition Was In).” Another followed with “Ruby, Don't Take Your Love to Town” when the group became Kenny Rogers and the First Edition.

He leaped to superstardom as a solo artist in 1977 with the Grammy-winning “Lucille.” He went on to acting in shows inspired by his songs such as “The Gambler” and “Coward of the County.”

“Lucille,” about an affair with a woman who broke a good man's heart, was the turning point, he said.

“I remember listening to that song and saying, boy, do I love this. Who doesn't relate to that?” he said. “That thing just exploded and put me in a whole different stratosphere economically. And professionally.

“It allowed the band to grow, the production to grow and for me to be what I wanted to be, which was to be a big-time act.”

He looks for songs that touch him, knowing that he can make it touch others.

“What I've tried to do is find songs that are more than songs, songs that have social significance,” he said. “‘Reuben James' is about a black man who adopts a white child; ‘Ruby, Don't Take Your Love to Town' is a Vietnam war veteran working his way back to his family; ‘The Greatest' is about a kid trying to play baseball.

“These are not just songs but things that I think are important to say.”

Rogers, 74, shows no signs of slowing down and plans to release another album next year.

“I work 100 days a year, mostly weekends, and at Christmas it gets ugly — from the day after Thanksgiving I work 26 days in a row until Christmas Eve,” he said. “I'm exhausted when I go home, but it's fun because it's different from what I do the rest of the year.”

Rogers, though, said he loves his time off. When asked how he spends it, he said, “I have identical twin boys who are 8 years old — need I say more?”

John Goodspeed is a freelance writer. Email him at john@johngoodspeed.com.